Illustration

For Hire: Stunning Reveal near Columbia Road Market

Via Amanda Jacks on Twitter I was alerted to the reveal of this ghost sign near Columbia Road Market. It’s at the junction of Ravenscroft Street and Wellington Row. The text at the bottom is clearly ‘For Hire’ with the firm’s name being either O. or D. Leakin. (If anyone has street directories then feel […]

15 Dec 2017

Wine & Willing: A Stoke Newington Mystery

This fragment was one of my early discoveries when I first started noticing ghost signs in 2006. It was located on a very prominent wall on Stoke Newington Church Street, adjacent to William Patten School. At some stage after it was originally painted the patch of wall with this picture was probably covered by a […]

12 Nov 2017

Glasgow Ghostsigns Galore

I’ve been traveling a lot with work lately and was recently in Glasgow for a workshop. With a couple of hours to spare I looked up a few locations on the History of Advertising Trust Ghostsigns Archive and took to the streets. Here’s what I saw… An abandoned gallery and picture framers, F.W. Holroyd. The […]

18 Feb 2015

The restoration of the Brixton Windmill mural

Check out this photo essay from the London Mural Preservation Society documenting their project to repaint Brixton’s Windmill mural.  It is a fantastic achievement and a vibrant and colourful result at the end of this undertaking which involved many people from the community and beyond. Bravo!

9 Jul 2012

Joseph’s Hat Shop sign threatened in Austin, Texas

This great hand painted sign for Joseph’s Hat Shop in Austin Texas is set for demolition ahead of the construction of a new Marriott hotel.  Another photo showing the entire sign can be found here on the Glyn Lowe Photoworks website.

27 Jun 2012

Ukrainian Ghostsigns: Shadows of a Forgotten Past

Areta Kovalska just added a link to this post about ghostsigns from Lviv in Ukraine to the Ghostsigns Facebook page.  It not only has some fascinating images but also some insightful observations on the meaning of these pieces of painted advertising from the former Soviet Union.  See more from Areta on the Shadows from a […]

14 Jun 2012

‘It hasta be SHASTA’: Great slogan and preservation debate from San Francisco

Great collection of signs and a write up on the Perception Filter blog about this soft drink campaign in San Francisco.  More here.

15 Jan 2012

Fresh lick of paint

I received an email this morning from a mural artist with an interest in working to restore/repaint Ghostsigns in the UK. She found me via a great project being run by the London Mural Preservation Society. I started drafting a response and then realised I’ve never written specifically about this topic and thought a blog […]

7 May 2011

Gillette Razors

Frank Jump just posted this London sign he photographed while visiting in Spring 2001. It’s a classic Gillette ad with the characteristic blue background colour. The sign below is one I took on Clapham High Street and part of a an ongoing Campaign that Gillette ran in the Brickad format. You can see on the Clapham […]

2 Jul 2007

Panasonic (New York)

Lena found this one some time ago lurking on the Wikipedia entry for Panasonic [Update: It no longer appears there]. It’s a fantastically simple design and a really nice photo from Uris. See the full size image here [Update: Link no longer active]. The information on Wikipedia says that the company stopped selling bikes in USA […]

25 Jun 2007

Mister Furniture (France)

My mum just got back from France where there is a great tradition of painted sign writing. This one is from Beziers in the south of the country and says “Mister Furniture Sauvagnac”. See this website for more French examples.

25 Jun 2007

Colossal Media

The art of large scale sign writing lives on in New York, USA through the work of Colossal Media  A full gallery of their work is available on their site but here are a couple of highlights, one more old school and one much more modern in terms of both product and design. These ads […]

20 Jun 2007

Peterkin’s Custard

Further to the post on Louis Sheldon-Williams, here’s my photo of the full Peterkin’s Custard sign (featured in the Time Out piece). The little boy looks to be of Dutch origin (look at the clogs) but information on the company is thin on the ground.

19 Jun 2007